“Mom?”
“Yes, sweetheart?”
“Do you know what I’m going to ask Santa for next year?”
My whole body froze.
“What?”
He smiled.
“For the three of us to come here again.”
For a moment, I turned toward the window so he wouldn’t see my eyes.
Because my child was talking about next year.
And I didn’t know how much time we had been given.
Then I walked back to him, kissed his forehead, and said:
“Then starting tomorrow, we have to collect as many memories as we possibly can.”
That photograph was taken that day.
To most people, it is simply a beautiful picture of a mother and her son in front of the Eiffel Tower.
To me, it is something else entirely.
It is the day I finally understood something.
We spend our whole lives saying:
“Someday we’ll do it.”
“We’ll go later.”
“There will be time.”
